t. If it concerns my flight from the
Convent, surely the Pope's mandate is all-sufficient. But, be it what
it may, in the hands of my faithful Knight and of my trusted friend,
the Bishop, I may safely leave it. I do but ask that, the work
accomplished, you come with all speed back to me."

With a swift movement he dropped on one knee at her feet.

"Send me away with a blessing," he said. "Bless me before I go."

She laid her hands on the bowed head.

"Alas!" she cried, "how shall I let thee go?"

Then, pushing her fingers deeper into his hair and bending over him,
with infinite tenderness: "How shall thy wife bless thee?" she
whispered.

He caught his breath, as the fragrance of the newly gathered roses at
her bosom reached and enveloped him.

"Bless me," he said, hoarsely, "as the Prioress of the White Ladies
used to bless her nuns, and the Poor at the Convent gate."

"Dear Heart," she said, and smiled. "That seems so long ago!" Then, as
with bent head he still waited, she steadied her voice, lifting her
hands from off him; then laid them back upon his head, with reverent
and solemn touch. "The Lord bless thee," she said, "and keep thee; and
may our blessed Lady, who hath restored me to thee, bring thee safely
back to me again."

At that, Hugh raised his head and looked up into her face, and the
misery in his eyes stirred her tenderness as it had never been stirred
by the vivid love-light or the soft depths of passion she had
heretofore seen in them.

Her lips parted; her breath came quickly. She would have caught him to
her bosom; she would have kissed away this unknown sorrow; she would
have smothered the pain, in the sweetness of her embrace.

But bending swiftly he lifted the hem of her robe and touched it with
his lips; then, rising, turned and left her without a word; without a
backward look.

He left her standing there, alone in the banqueting hall. And as she
stood listening, with beating heart, to the sound of his voice raised
in command; to the quick movements of his horse's hoofs on the paving
stones, as he swung into the saddle; to the opening of the gates and
the riding forth of the little cavalcade, a change seemed to have come
over her. She ceased to feel herself a happy, yielding bride, a
traveller in distant lands, after long journeyings, once more at home.

She seemed to be again Prioress of the White Ladies. The calm fingers
of the Cloister fastened once more upon her pulsin